Saturday, 26 November 2011

LIMBANG: Although there is no evidence of its existence, the public especially school children are haunted by the rumour of alleged headhunters actively seeking for prey during this school holidays.

The rumour is spreading fast among the people here and is a hot topic at coffee shops.

The often-repeated story tells of headhunters targeting children for their heads, to be kept inside bridge pillars under construction to strengthen its structure.

The rumour says the process is conducted by a shaman who performs certain rites to ensure the bridge be structurally strong where the decapitated head serves as a ‘dish’ to compensate the spiritual being said to haunt the bridge.

Acting District Police chief Superintendent Bukhori Saffai has advised the public not to believe the spreading rumour.

“The bridge is made by well-trained and qualified engineers and experts and they do not employ diviners.

“Do not listen to this nonsense about ‘pengait’ (the local term for such hunters) looking for heads to be used to reinforce and strengthen a bridge that is being built,” he said when asked to on the hot topic that has caused much fear among the public here.

Moreover, he said it was possible that the issue was deliberately raised during the school holidays so that the children would not wander out of the house.

“Perhaps there is wisdom behind this story so that the children would not leave the house during the school holidays.

“Instead, parents should be more vigilant so that their children do not get involved in criminal activities and immoral acts,” Bukhori said adding that no report has been received on the issue so far.

Observation made by The Borneo Post revealed that the story began to spread since the construction of the Pandaruan Bridge.

A similar story also haunted the people of Limbang in the early 90s during the construction of the Batu Danau Bridge.

The Bureau of Surrealist Ethnology

The Bureau of Surrealist Ethnology was founded in July 2007 in Devon, UK. Our investigations encompass myth, legends, calendar customs and the ritual year, murder ballads, jokes and proverbs, dancing, graffiti, and all other outbreaks of the Marvellous in vernacular culture. This collectanea project brings together a wide range of data, from various sources, which all have one thing in common: poetry. These data in turn form the basis of our more theoretical elaborations and investigations.